UK Wants Pubs To Be Responsible For Patrons

June 2, 2010 By Jay Brooks

pub-sign
According to an article in the UK’s Publican, the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (or, ironically, NICE), which describes itself as “an independent organisation responsible for providing national guidance on promoting good health and preventing and treating ill health,” has made several recommendations for tackling their nation’s alcohol abuse problems.

I’ll skip most of these. Not only have they been floated before, but I and many others have discredited them before. They recommend the old saws; minimum pricing, limiting the number of places in a given area where alcohol may be purchased and a total advertising ban. Most of them are nonsense, but here’s the one that sticks out this time around.

“Protection of the public’s health” should be added to the current licensing objectives.

What that means essentially, is that NICE wants pubs to be legally responsible for individual customers’ behavior as a condition of being licensed by the government to sell alcohol. There are already laws, at least on this side of the pond, where bartenders can’t serve a person who is obviously intoxicated or at least over-intoxicated. I don’t know if the UK has a similar law.

I’ve never liked these kinds of laws, because they’re overly paternalistic. They remove personal responsibility and place it on businesses, and their employees, to determine for someone when they’ve had enough. Now obviously, there are some people for whom their behavior makes this very easy and those people should not be served more alcohol. No bar I know wants to keep serving a belligerent or sloppy drunk. It’s not really good for business for a variety of reasons. These laws also give people an excuse to act irresponsibly, knowing they can always blame someone else, using the law to their advantage and avoiding any responsibility on their own part.

But what about the judgment calls? Only an individual can really determine when he or she has had enough. Yes, I understand that there are people who lose their ability to judge when they drink too much. Those people are usually pretty obvious about it. But this is about the minority abusers. The majority can self determine when to stop. But we keep trying to enact laws that affect everyone, even the people who are mature enough to take care of themselves in most situations. We always end of punishing everyone because of the actions of a few. That’s why paternalism is such a bad idea. The government has no business trying to protect people from themselves. There are plenty of other laws for alcohol abusers to break that don’t effect the responsible drinkers.

Then, of course, there’s the freedom to just get drunk if you want to. I wouldn’t advocate this as a lifestyle, but every now and again it feels good to get rip-roaring drunk. As long as you didn’t drive, made plans on how to get home and aren’t bothering other people, why shouldn’t you be allowed to get and maintain yourself in a drunken state? What business is it of the government to try to make sure that never happens, at least not in public. And yet there are laws against public drunkenness? Why?

And the notion that this is about the “public health” is laughable when it’s aimed only at alcohol. At least beer has many proven health benefits. Soda has no health benefits or nutritional value whatsoever, yet no one’s advocating we cut people off when they’ve had too much soda pop. We still sometimes have soda machines in our schools. The obesity and poor health caused by a diet of soda places a burden on any nation’s health care system, yet where’s the hue and cry over that? Red meat has a lot of protein, but over-indulging in eating it can cause many health problems that similarly tax healthcare. Why are restaurant owners allowed to serve someone as big as steak as they want? Why isn’t there a push for legislation limiting the amount of bacon that can be served at a Sunday brunch? Sounds ridiculous, right? But it’s exactly what NICE is proposing. We only find it funny when it’s not about alcohol. With alcohol, we accept that it has to be regulated in such a fashion.

But that’s just years of anti-alcohol propaganda to the point where most people accept that alcohol is inherently evil. It’s not. It can’t be. Alcohol just is. It takes each individual person to determine their own relationship with it. And most get along with it just fine. The great majority of adults can and do drink responsibly their entire lives. No intervention necessary. And that percentage would be even higher if we were allowed to educate our kids about it, if it didn’t carry such a ridiculous stigma created by people opposed to it and if it wasn’t constantly under attack by such people.

I would never argue that there aren’t people who shouldn’t drink or who are unable to handle themselves around alcohol. There will always be such people, just as there are junkies, over-eaters and addictive personalities of every stripe. We cannot eradicate such people or problems by punishing everyone else who doesn’t abuse alcohol, or whatever else we’re trying to stop from being abused. But time and time again, that’s what well-meaning (I continue to hope) government agencies and organizations continue to propose. It’s a shame for the rest of us that they never, ever, work.

A-B InBev To Sell Off British Beer Brands

May 26, 2010 By Jay Brooks

abib
The Times of London is reporting that Anheuser-Busch InBev is looking for buyers to sell off some of its most iconic British beer brands, including Bass, Boddington’s and Flowers. In the article, Buyer Sought for Beer That Britain Forgot, it appears the asking price for Bass is £10-15 million ($15-21 million in dollars), though that apparently “excludes both the trademark and international rights.”

bass

But it doesn’t look good, overall. From the Times article:

Despite its fame and longevity, Bass is now a minuscule part of the world’s biggest brewer, with volumes equating to a tiny fraction of the amount sold in its heyday in the 1980s. The brand, now brewed under contract by Marston’s, a rival brewer, which owns Pedigree ale, has suffered from a combination of lack of marketing investment and falling consumer demand as its multinational owner has focused increasingly on its global lager brands.
Boddingtons, too, has declined under AB InBev’s hands. The brand was once a leading part of the old Whitbread Beer Company, but its fortunes have dwindled since the closure in 2005 of the Strangeways brewery in Manchester, where it had been brewed since the late 18th century.
Despite the long history of the brands that AB InBev is looking to sell, finding a buyer could prove tricky. Obvious suitors including Marston’s, Wells & Young’s, Molson Coors and C&C Group are understood to have ruled themselves out.

Beer In Art #77: George Garrard’s Whitbread Brewery

May 23, 2010 By Jay Brooks

art-beer
Today’s works of art are from the 18th century by a fairly minor artist: George Garrard, who was born in London and lived from May 31, 1760 to October 8, 1826. The first painting below is entitled Loading the Drays at Whitbread Brewery, Chiswell Street, London, and was painted in 1783.

Garrard_loading-drays

The second, below here, is known as Whitbread Brewery in Chiswell Street and was painted the previous year, 1792. Wikipedia has a little more information about an engraving of it. “A painted engraving of Whitbread Brewery in Chiswell Street London in 1792. It it also titled ‘A View from the East-End of the Brewery Chiswell Street, The famous Whitbread Brewery. A carthorse is being backed into a dray.'”

Garrard_whitbread

Here’s some biographical information about Garrard, from Answers.com:

George Garrard (b London, 31 May 1760; d London, 8 Oct 1826). English painter and sculptor. After serving an apprenticeship with Sawrey Gilpin, later his father-in-law, Garrard became a student at the Royal Academy Schools, London, in 1778, exhibiting his first sporting picture there in 1781. Though his occasional genre paintings were better received than his many animal subjects (Sir Joshua Reynolds purchased his View of a Brew-house Yard from the Academy exhibition of 1784), he initially determined to practise as a sporting artist, probably on the advice of the notorious sportsman Colonel Thomas Thornton (1755-1823) for whom he had worked in the 1780s.

You can see a few more of Garrard’s paintings at Bridgeman and also at the Tate Museum.

The Beer Genie Out Of The Bottle

May 13, 2010 By Jay Brooks

beer-genie
The British Beer & Pub Association (or BBPA), a UK trade association for pubs, launched a new website recently called the Beer Genie. It’s aimed at bringing the “magic of beer” to consumers. The site is “themed around beer’s power of sociability” and certainly seems to have a lot of decent information. It’s also got quite a number of sections, including Beer & BBQ’s, World Cup Beers, the History of Beer, beer & Women, Beer Facts, Knowledge and Links, Beer & Christmas, Beer & Entertaining, Beer & Weddings and a Gallery. It certainly seems like a better effort than Here’s To Beer, A-B’s failed attempt to do something similar a few years ago. At least this has the support of more than one big brewery.

Boobquake Monday

April 23, 2010 By Jay Brooks

This is slightly off topic, except that I learned about it from British beer writer Melissa Cole. Perhaps you saw the news report where Iranian cleric Hojatoleslam Kazem Sedighi is blaming earthquakes on women. Well, not all women, just the ones with the temerity to show a little skin. Sedighi is quoted as follows. “Many women who do not dress modestly … lead young men astray, corrupt their chastity and spread adultery in society, which (consequently) increases earthquakes.” Crazy, right? Maybe, but let’s make sure first.

Purdue senior Jen McCreight has a plan to test Sedighi’s theory. She wrote an offhand blog post at her Blag Hag entitled In the Name of Science, I Offer My Boobs. She’s asking all women everywhere this Monday, April 26, to wear their most revealing outfit, whether it’s cleavage enhancing, shoulder baring or ankle-showing. The idea is to see if all that immodest dressing (or lack of it) will “significantly increase the number or severity of earthquakes.” It may have started as a little joke, but nearly 90,000 people have signed up to participate on the Facebook Event Page for Boobquake so the event is taking on a life of its own. She’s even written some additional clarifications in case the idea raises your feminine hackles.

Here’s her entreaty to participate:

On Monday, April 26th, I will wear the most cleavage-showing shirt I own. Yes, the one usually reserved for a night on the town. I encourage other female skeptics to join me and embrace the supposed supernatural power of their breasts. Or short shorts, if that’s your preferred form of immodesty. With the power of our scandalous bodies combined, we should surely produce an earthquake. If not, I’m sure Sedighi can come up with a rational explanation for why the ground didn’t rumble. And if we really get through to him, maybe it’ll be one involving plate tectonics.

According to the Facebook Fan Page, the story’s now been featured on CNN and will be covered on BBC News shortly. I know Melissa Cole will be playing along, how about you? Can the immodesty of bare skin produce an earthquake? Let’s find out this Monday. If you decide to participate and tweet about it, the hashtag is #boobquake.

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British actress/model Jennifer Ellison doing her part a few years early, at a 2008 Axe the Tax Rally.

Beer In Art #73: Charles Spencelayh’s The Steward

April 18, 2010 By Jay Brooks

art-beer
Today’s work of art is something of a find. I wrote about it when I highlighted another work by the same artist early in my Beer In Art series. In fact, it was the sixth work back in 2008, Charles Spencelayh’s Good Health. After sharing his biography from Wikipedia, I also discovered the following.

Supposedly, he may have done a painting commissioned by the Bass Brewery for them to use in advertising entitled The Steward, depicting a steward opening a bottle of Bass. But so far I’ve been unable to find anything more about it or see what it looks like.

Happily, Diane Hadley, a pub owner in the UK, wrote me to tell me she had one of either 6 or 10 copies Bass gave out hanging in her pub. It was given to her by a Bass representative “some 22 years ago.” And more importantly, she was kind enough to take a few photos of it and send them my way, so I can share it with the world. So here is The Steward, by Charles Spencelayh. Thanks Diane.

Spencelayh-steward-1

The bottom of the print includes the following text:

‘THE STEWARD’
by Charles Spencelayh H.R.B.S.A., R.M.S., V.P.B.W.S.
The subject of this finely executed work is thought to have been the Steward at the old Bass Club in High Street, Burton upon Trent. Spencelayh, however, kept very poor records of his work which he frequently did not sign or date. He is known to have produced a number of other outstanding paintings of well known commercial products in his early life.

Here’s a closer view.
Spencelayh-steward-2

And here’s a close-up of the Bass Ale bottles sitting on a tray.
Spencelayh-steward-3

Five of his paintings are at the Tate in London and a few more are shown at the online Art Renewal Center and Bridgeman has quite a few. There are also some links at the ArtCyclopedia.

Beer In Ads #71: Mackeson’s Milk Stout Love

March 23, 2010 By Jay Brooks

ad-billboard
Tuesday’s ad is for Mackeson’s Stout, originally brewed by the Hythe Brewery in Kent, which was founded in 1699. The Mackeson family acquired the brewery in 1801 and introduced their most enduring beer, the milk stout, in 1907, before being taken over by Whitbread in the late 1920s. I love the notion that the milk stout is the product of illicit love between beer and milk, though of course there’s no actual milk in the beer.

Mackeson-milk-stout

Redesign Newcastle’s Label

March 13, 2010 By Jay Brooks

Whatever your feelings about Newcastle Brown Ale, it is perceived as one of the classic English brown ales and its label is one of the most recognizable.

newcastle

So I was surprised to see that Newcastle is sponsoring a contest to redesign their iconic label. The contest is known as Your Beer Your Label and gives you two ways to create a new label, either using their online label generator or download a template and have at it with your favorite graphics software (or at least Adobe Illustrator or Photoshop).

newk-ale-queen

The Online Design Tool is actually pretty fun to use and you can do quite a bit of manipulation using it, as evidenced by the many submitted designs.

newk-superstar

Unfortunately, the contest ends tomorrow, so if you want to play around or submit your own, you better get cracking.

newk-last-name-ever

Though you can still look at the submitted designs and vote for your favorite until the end of March.

newk-drink-up

Though in the end I wish they were going to do a run of bottles with the winner’s design or, better still, with the top few vote-getters. I think that would have been cool. But instead all the winners get is displayed on Newcastle’s website which seems like a pretty poor payoff for all the effort.

newk-vintage

Oh, well, perhaps it’s just as well, as despite some very cool label designs submitted, the label below is currently at the top of the heap with the most votes cast. I guess that either says something about human nature or the demographics of Newcastle drinkers.

newk-number-1

Your Worst Nightmare

March 10, 2010 By Jay Brooks

I probably shouldn’t speak for you, but this is certainly my worst nightmare. I tweeted this yesterday, but thought it still deserving of a snarky comment again today. Somewhere near Manchester, England is the Alcohol-Free Shop, a store dedicated to all things non-alcoholic. They carry non-alcoholic beer, wine, cider, ready-made cocktails and celebration drinks. They actually don’t carry that many different N/A Beers — are there very many? — but have plenty of other products.

But here’s the one think that actually bothers me. The company’s motto, slogan, whatever is “alcohol-free is good for you.” My problem with that is, of course, it’s not remotely true. Study after study has shown that people who drink moderately live longer, and are generally healthier, than people who either drink too much or abstain altogether. Being alcohol-free is therefore, in effect, bad for you. It’s good for you at all.

alco-free

Under the heading Why Choose Alcohol Free?, they suggest “it is also recommended that we all have at least two alcohol-free days a week.” I’ve never heard that one before, have you? And how convenient that the first place I’ve heard it is a place trying to sell non-alcoholic drinks.

Then there’s this gem:

Our range of non-alcoholic, alcohol-free, and de-alcoholised drinks give people the opportunity to still enjoy a glass of wine with a meal or a bottle of beer on a sunny terrace and keep within healthy alcohol-consumption limits.

I’ve only had a few N/A wines but the ones I’ve tried were every bit as bad as the N/A beers. If you want to lay off the alcohol for a night, just have something naturally non-alcoholic, not an impostor that tastes like crap anyway. What’s the point?

Here’s their list of when and who might want non-alcoholic drinks:

Healthy lifestyles [except it’s healthier to drink alcohol moderately]
Sports and fitness enthusiasts [wasn’t there something last year about beer being better to hydrate with after a work-out than water?]
Weight watchers [except the calorie difference doesn’t make up for the flavor differential]
Drivers [sure, but just take the night off if you’re the DD]
Expectant mums [actually, some moderate alcohol is fine according to most MD’s]
Expectant dads [huh?]
Nursing mothers [many pediatricians recommend a beer a day to promote lactation]
People on medication [if you’re sick, you’re probably not out drinking]
People suffering some illnesses [see previous comment]
Alcoholics
People with mental health problems [if I’m crazy, I’m drinking, but maybe that’s just me]
Religious observations

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